Britain's Conservatives warned on Saturday a stalemate in the upcoming election would threaten the country's economy as polls showed the tightest election race in nearly 20 years was likely to produce no outright winner, Reutres reported. A surge in support for the Liberal Democrats has increased the prospect of a "hung parliament", with no single party in control, for the first time since the days of the global oil crisis in 1974. The opposition Conservatives' once commanding lead in the polls has withered in recent weeks and they now lack the support needed to guarantee a return to power in the May 6 vote, after 13 years in opposition. The latest surveys on Saturday gave the Conservatives a five-point lead over their rivals. The Lib Dems and Prime Minister Gordon Brown's Labour Party were neck and neck on 29 percent in one, while the other showed Labour trailing in third. The election race has been thrown wide open by a rise in support for the Lib Dems following the strong performances of the party's leader Nick Clegg in Britain's first U.S.-style live televised debates. Conservative leader David Cameron focused a campaign speech on Saturday almost totally on the risk he said a hung parliament would pose, particularly to the economy as Britain slowly emerges from the worst recession since World War Two. Polls say the economy is far and away the voters' biggest concern and the issue has dominated the campaign. "We need to win this argument in this election campaign that a hung parliament isn't a change for the better, it would be a change for the worse," said Cameron, adding it would leave politicians "bickering, horse-trading and arguing". The prospect of an inconclusive election result has worried financial markets which fear a coalition government would fail to make spending cuts needed to tackle a record budget deficit. However, analysts have suggested markets might be coming round to the idea that a hung parliament would not be as damaging as initially feared. The Conservatives want to cut the deficit, running at more than 11 percent of GDP, more quickly and deeply than Prime Minister Gordon Brown's Labour government. -- SPA
